Nietzsche and Dostoevsky

Philosophy, Morality, Tragedy

Edited by Jeff Love and Jeffrey Metzger

After more than a century, the urgency with which the writing of Fyodor Dostoevsky and Friedrich Nietzsche speaks to us is undiminished. Nietzsche explicitly acknowledged Dostoevsky’s relevance to his work, noting its affinities as well as its points of opposition. Both of them are credited with laying much of the foundation for what came to be called existentialist thought. The essays in this volume bring a fresh perspective to a relationship that illuminates a great deal of twentieth-century intellectual history. Among the questions taken up by contributors are the possibility of morality in a godless world, the function of philosophy if reason is not the highest expression of our humanity, the nature of tragedy when performed for a bourgeois audience, and the justification of suffering if it is not divinely sanctioned. Above all, these essays remind us of the supreme value of the questioning itself that pervades the work of Dostoevsky and Nietzsche.

About the Author

JEFF LOVE is a professor of Russian and German at Clemson University in South Carolina.

JEFFREY METZGER is an associate professor of government at Cameron University in Oklahoma.

Reviews

"These engaging and powerfully written essays contribute a variety of new perspectives about the shared legacy of Nietzsche and Dostoevsky as 'tragic' analysts and prophets of the modern condition. The collection is organized around the core theme of 'dangerous truth'—that is, around the question of whether truth is produced or perceived, a form of shelter or a kind of violence. Love and Metzger provide a highly interesting and provocative discussion.” —Val Vinokur, author of The Trace of Judaism: Dostoevsky, Babel, Mandelstam, Levinas

"This is an outstanding collection of scholarship on the connections and disconnections of two fascinating and massively influential writers.” —James P. Scanlan, author of Dostoevsky the Thinker